Ibn Masarra

(4,438 words)

, Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Masarra al-D̲j̲abalī , Andalusian philosopher and mystic, born at Cordova in 269/883 and died in 319/931 in a hermitage on the Sierra near this town, to which he had retired long before. He lived during a period in which Muslim Spain suffered a veritable inquisition conducted by the Mālikī fuḳahāʾ . His father, ʿAbd Allāh, who may have been of Christian descent, was a Muʿtazilī and in order to teach his doctrines had to take many precautions. The young Muḥammad became his pupil and received from him a theological educatio…